Thoughts on politics, law, culture and guns from an eclectic, but mainly center-right point of view

Friday, May 17, 2013

Well Equipped Enemy

Here's an iconic photo of the Battle of the Bulge, a German soldier with a bayonet carried just below his throat, 8mm machine gun belt (with disintegrating links, just like we use now) over his shoulder and a machine gun just out of view.

It's not the only war photo with him in it.

Here he is with his Nazi pals smoking a cigarette. He has a Browning 9mm pistol in his right hand (John Browning's last design, manufactured in captured Belgium). That's an American 6 wheel M8 armored car called a Greyhound in the background.

And here he is yet again in a group photo. This time his hands are full of the Browning and an MG 42 with a bipod. Don't these guys know that cigarettes will kill you?

He's not in this photo, but a smoking Bengal Tiger tank is with two GIs walking past admiring it. The lead American soldier appears to have picked up an STG 44. Lots of soldiers pick up enemy weapons if they are better than the ones they carry. At one time it was believed that Ferdinand Porsche designed the turret on the tank, but that is a myth.